Omega Force 01- Storm Force (29 page)

“Just
tell me one thing.” Kell sounded bone weary, but his
eyes were lively pools of blue-green fire when he turned his head to look at
her.

She
hoped it wasn’t about how they’d explain all this, because she didn’t have a
clue. “What is it?”

Kell reached out with his right hand and grasped hers.
“Please tell me the new alpha of the Dires isn’t a
sociopath.”

“Those are two scary women.”

Garret
Foley, aka Gadget, sat on the porch of Cote Blanche early on Labor Day morning.
On the dock, tossing a dirty yellow tennis ball back and forth while Gator bounded
between them, stood Mori and Robin, just a wolf and an
eagle enjoying a game of ball with a hound dog.

Kell needed a drink.

“You
don’t know the half of it, man.” Nik emerged from the
cabin with a glass of whiskey and handed chilled beer bottles to Kell and Gadget. “And by the way, the room service ends
here unless you start tipping better.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Kell
raised the bottle in salute and took a long drink. “Happy
Labor Day.”

Only,
it wasn’t happy for all of them. Archer remained in Tennessee and didn’t know
when he’d return. Losing Adam had sapped his spirit, and Kell
knew firsthand that mourning didn’t operate on a time clock. However long it
took, they’d give it to him.

Not
that he’d be going on any missions himself for a while.

“When’s
the surgery?” Nik watched the drama unfold on the
dock as Robin pushed Mori in the water, then dove after her. After a few
seconds of whining and pacing, Gator jumped in as well.

“Next
week. Back in Houston.” He didn’t know when he’d made
the decision to have the spinal fusion, but he thought it was sometime between
getting his head bashed against the footboard and pulling the back brace out of
the trunk. The decision had come long before he got his fingers rebroken and set, before he made sure that Trey and his
family were OK and that Michael had merely eavesdropped on them and stolen the
boat, and before the colonel had chewed him a new asshole to go along with his
previous three or four.

He
turned to Nik. “Can you tell me if the surgery’s
going to be successful?” At the frown on Nik’s face,
he retreated. “Never mind. Not fair of me to ask you
that.”

“I’d
tell you if I knew, but I’m not getting any visions on that subject.”

“What
about me?” Gadget balanced his chair on its back legs, finally setting aside
the cell phone that seemed attached to the end of his fingers. “Can you tell
when I’m going to find a woman?” He watched Mori and Robin climb out of the
water, their clothes dripping. “Maybe one like that?”

Knowing those two, they’d be
naked within the hour.

Kell shook his head. “Man, you aren’t
ready for one like that.”

“And I can’t see that far into
the future,” Nik said. “You know, because it’s
so
far from happening.”

“Funny.” But Gadget grinned.

Kell’s phone rang from inside the
cabin, and Gadget levered himself out of the rocker. “I’ll get it. Probably the colonel wanting to yell some more. My turn to get reamed. You two have had your time in the hot
seat.”

Nik watched Robin and Mori sitting
at the end of the dock, their legs dangling over the side, Gator sitting
between them. “You and Mori staying together?”

Kell glanced at him but couldn’t read
his expression. “I figure you already know the answer to that.”

“It’s not going to be easy.”

“I know.” He didn’t know, really.
After the colonel had spun some magic, everything had been tied up all nice and
tidy. Michael Benedict, the millionaire shipping magnate, had been living a
secret life, it seemed. He had masterminded the Zemurray
bombing to kill off the business competition, then mysteriously died in a freak
boating accident near Lake Charles after Hurricane Geneva made landfall. Nik had arrived in time to dump the body.

The media ate it up.

The colonel made a lot of noise
about protocol and unacceptable behavior, but Kell
figured he was glad to have the whole thing go away, case closed. No one was
alive to contradict the story except Mori’s parents, and he didn’t think they’d
be talking.

The new Dire
alpha was a hotshot lawyer with a busy career, a human wife, and no interest in
Mori other than as a possible means of extending their species, however she
wanted to do it.

So his woman, his mate, his
whatever-she-turned-out-to-be, would have another man’s children. Kell thought he was OK with that, but he couldn’t be sure
until he was faced with a toddler who could bodily throw his stepdaddy through a plateglass
window.

Nik was probably right. It wouldn’t
be easy at all, but it would be worth it.

“Mori and me — is that what’s been
eating at you since you got here?” Nik had been
drinking even more than usual and talking less. At first, Kell
thought it was because he didn’t like being around Mori; he knew his friend
blamed her for dragging him into Dire politics. It had been his choice, though,
and he had no regrets.

In some ways, things were better.
He had finally accepted that his active duty to the Rangers was done. But he’d
also learned that he could be just as valuable to his country by being part of
Omega Force.

Nik shook his head. “I don’t know
what’s wrong. I’ve been having dreams. Bad ones. Like
something’s going to happen that’s” — he shrugged — “catastrophic, maybe.”

Kell studied his friend’s profile. He
looked as exhausted as the rest of them, but haunted, too. And Nik wasn’t one to exaggerate. If he thought something bad
was coming, it probably was.

Gadget came back out with the
phone. “It’s the colonel, all right. But he wants you.”

Kell took the phone. “Colonel?”

“When’s that surgery of yours?” The
man was never much for small talk.

Mori and Robin walked down the
dock toward them, clearly listening.

“Next week. Probably
a month of rehab after that.”

The silence on the line was
ominous. “Put Dimitrou on the phone.”

Kell raised his eyebrows and handed
the phone to Nik, who looked a little ill. And worried. He pushed the button on the side of the phone
to put it on speaker.

“What’s up, Colonel?”

“We’ve got a job. Kellison’s strictly
strategy on this one, so you’re leading the team. Get to DC yesterday. Kellison, get Archer Logan back on the job and wait for
instructions.”

The call ended as abruptly as it
had begun.

“That man needs a sedative.”
Robin jerked her wet T-shirt over her head and shimmied out of her shorts. Kell shook his head at Gadget’s audible gasp. “And I need a
swim. Sounds like this freaking vacation is over.”

Photograph by Dianne Ludlam

Susannah
Sandlin is a native of Winfield, Alabama, and has worked as a writer and editor
in educational publishing in Alabama, Illinois, Texas, California, and
Louisiana. She currently lives in Auburn, Alabama, with two rescue dogs named
after professional wrestlers (it was a phase). She
has a no-longer-secret passion for Cajun and French-Canadian music and reality
TV, and is on the hunt for a long-haul ice road trucker who also saves nuisance
gators. Susannah is also the author of the Penton Legacy paranormal romance
series:
Redemption
,
Absolution
, and
Omega
.

This book was originally released in episodes as a Kindle Serial. Kindle Serials launched in 2012 as a new way to experience serialized books. Kindle Serials allow readers to enjoy the story as the author creates it, purchasing once and receiving all existing episodes immediately, followed by future episodes as they are published. To find out more about Kindle Serials and to see the current selection of Serials titles, visit
www.amazon.com/kindleserials
.